Strength
by Angel of Shadow and Snow
Summary: A gift for the amazing Turkmen! A confrontation between Sinedd and Artegor set after series 2. Sinedd comes to a new understanding with his coach about what "being strong" truly is and Artegor learns a little something about his protègè too.


_A one-shot gift for the amazingly awesome **Turkmen,**_ _who is a truly superb writer and artist!  
She makes an excellent point that there are not enough fics on the protégé/coach relationship between Artegor and Sinedd. This is an interesting, intricate relationship that I'm going to take a shot at exploring...._

_Set just after the finale of Season Two...  
_

* * *

Sinedd stared nonchalantly down at his hands, watching his bloodless knuckles clench and relax beneath fingerless red gloves with ever shallow breath he took.  
He tried to remember the last time he had clenched his knuckles like this; when he could feel no pain from his shoulders down because everything had just gone numb.  
With anticipation?  
Dread?  
Anger?  
...Fear?  
"No," he told himself. "You don't get scared that easily. You're a super-star...you have to be tough..."

Ah yes, that was right.  
The last time he'd done this was outside the office at the orphanage on the outskirts of Akillian.  
He was waiting for his first set of foster parents- the first of many- to come out to collect him. Sinedd remembered hearing the hazy, soft voices of the social workers telling his "new parents" about his problems...the nightmares, the fights.  
"But he likes football though," he could recall them saying. "He'll give you no trouble if you let him play to his heart's content."  
Sinedd could still feel the dull thud of resentment in his chest.  
He didn't want "new parents."  
He wanted his old parents back...the ones who loved him...

Tears bit at his eyes but he refused to let them spill out on account of a memory. Especially when it was just a fuzzy, meagre little picture in his head that could do nothing to hurt him now.

Instead, he drove his mind into trying to recall the last time he was sitting outside Artegor's office. He could remember it pretty well. He had been feeling pretty good that same day. It was his first day after training with the Shadows and he was waiting to collect his number eleven jersey...the one his coach had worn before him...  
He remembered the proud smile on Artegor's face; the man was beaming behind his violet shades, like he was handing on a legacy.

Now Sinedd felt like he was sitting outside a lion's den, waiting for the slaughter.  
He had a feeling he knew what this was about, even so.

Artegor had been talking to Aarch.  
Who had been talking to D'Jok.  
Who of course had been talking to Rocket.

And Rocket had been playing Netherball- an illegal, underground grudge-match version of football with no rules.  
He had no regrets though. He had been king of the sphere, chosen specifically by the mysterious entrepreneur, Harris, for his superior skill.  
Even if he was never paid as promised, the games had ended in destruction and there had always been something unsettling about his "employer", he had no regrets. It wasn't about rebellion or cash...it was about power and reputation.

The Snow Kids former captain Rocket, seemed to grasp that. Sinedd's ankle still twinged uncomfortably in the place where he had landed on it during his game...or rather _fight_...with the "new" Rocket. Power could bring out the worst in weak people.  
But Sinedd was never weak.

He didn't go running off or crying or choking when the Shadow's powerful flux, the smog, had disappeared. He stuck it out, dealing with the head-aches, the shortness in breath and the fainting.  
He dealt with it in isolation too.  
Sinedd didn't go crying to anyone about it. But did he really have anyone to cry to?

The office door slid open.  
"Come in Sinedd, and take a seat," came Artegor's coarse, hardened voice.  
It had been a tough year for the Shadows from losing their flux to being beaten by a completely mediocre team- the Pirates. The Shadow's coach's face, reflected this. Artegor's eyes were heavy beneath his sun-glasses. His dark, thickly gelled curls were tousled and untidy from the stresses of being ripped at and lines of worry and contempt marked his brow and lip.

Sinedd strode inside as slowly as possible, taking in surroundings; everything from his coach's vexed face to the sound of the door sliding shut behind him. He didn't hesitate in taking all the time in the galaxy to drag over a chair and sit down.

Artegor looked at him for a moment, a predator sizing up his prey, then with a short breath, he was in for the kill.  
"It's always trouble with you, isn't it?" he snapped, slamming a fist down on to the desk. Sinedd kept still, his lips glued together and eyes careless- this wasn't an act he hadn't seen before.  
"Why can't you just be like your team-mates, and NOT get into trouble every minute of every day!?"

Sinedd remained silent, taking each blow deeper and deeper but not letting a single inch of emotion leak out o to his face.  
"Between getting involved with that _Bleylock _man, conspiring to get rid every flux in the galaxy and now playing an ILLEGAL UNDERGROUND sport with _no rules_? What were you thinking? I don't know what kind of attention stunt you're always trying to pull but..."

Sinedd's ears became deaf to his coach's shouting as his mind drifted away from his body...out of the office...out of this planet...into the underground bowels of Genesis stadium...into the sphere...

He had been _royalty _there.  
"Well," he reminded himself. "I was always Galactik royalty, but there, I could prove it...I could prove it with no nagging coaches, no referees, no team-mates to hold me back...Just me, myself and I: the number one striker in the galaxy."

_"Until Rocket came along_," a nasty little voice in his head decided to point out. _"Rocket beat you..."  
_"But Harris chose _me_..." he insisted to himself, even though in his mind, his voice began to falter.

_"Or did he just exploit you? Just use you?_" the little voice went on. "_Like everyone else? Like Bleylock? Like your step-parents? Like your own coach? Like you let the smog use you and eat you alive? You're weak..." _

"No!"  
Sinedd's last words rang out of his dry, cracked lips causing Artegor to stop abruptly in his rant.  
"What was that?"

The dark haired striker thrust his chin upwards defiantly, despite the growing unrest in his stomach. "I'm not weak. I'm the best player on this team."

"Oh really?" Coach Nexus said, his lip curling into a dangerous kind of smirk. "If you're such a great player, my boy, than how could you just _abandon_ your team in the middle of a tournament?"

"First off, I'm not _your boy_ and secondly, _Coach_, you're nothing but a hypocrite!"  
"Oh? And why's that?" demanded Artegor, leaning forward in his chair with a dangerous rise to his voice. "How am I a hypocrite?"

Sinedd's heart suddenly became heavy with bitterness and his voice was tainted with contempt.  
"YOU left us the minute the smog did! You were weak! You ran off whining to your ol' pal Aarch and started coaching those Snow-Losers...OUR RIVALS! I didn't abandon the team, I didn't walk away..._you did_."  
Artegor snarled. "You don't understand _any_ of th-..."

"WHAT don't I understand? That Aarch doesn't use his players like bargaining chips? You were only interested in us when we got our flux back, because we could win and bring you glory and cash again. Is that what I don't understand?" he shouted, face slowly creasing in rage and eyes glittering with the burning flame of conflict.

"Aarch and I are **very **different people, boy," Artegor growled, his jaw clenching. " Now sit down and watch your mouth or so help me..."

"It bothers you because it's true, doesn't it?"  
A part of Sinedd wanted to stop this, right now. To stop himself from saying these things. But it was too late now...the words were flowing out of his mouth as easily as water from a tap.  
Getting colder and quicker with each fresh drop.

"It's true, isn't it?" he spat. "Aarch _cares _about his players! Rocket got in twice as much trouble as me this year and Aarch didn't make HIM play on a twisted ankle!"

"That was your own bloody fault! You were irresponsible enough to..."  
"I stuck it out," Sinedd cut across him, voice slicing into the air like a dagger. "But only because I had no other choice! Aarch actually CARES about his players and thinks about how THEY must be feeling once in a while!"

"Listen _you,_ I've only ever had your best interests in mind! I'm the one who _made _you!" he hissed. "I gave you the pushes you needed to become great. I may be tougher than Aarch but you wouldn't be here if it wasn't for me..."

Artegor rose, strutting around the desk and circling Sinedd's chair like a vulture. Tension hung in the air around them. Tension that was as heated and overbearing as the air around them.  
His invisible eyes swivelled down to the padded-shoulders of his protégé. He smiled, trailing a finger along the fur-edged hood of his jacket. Sinedd remained motionless, like the statue he always was. Stone. Hard, unbreakable stone.

"Remember I made you...remember, I brought you here...I taught you...I may not be a babysitter like Aarch, but I go hard on you all to make you strong. Strong like me..."

Sinedd laughed, a cruel snort through the nose. "No..."

"What?"

"You're not strong. You're _weak_...you left us..._you left me_."  
His voice quietened on the last few words as the truth finally spilled out.  
Maybe Sinedd didn't care about the other players and maybe he wasn't really that jealous of Aarch's players...maybe it was just that the one person he'd ever met who didn't stamp "problem-child" on his forehead or let an abrasive personality or a bad attitude intimidate them...left him again.  
_"Just like mom and dad..."_

Teardrops bit at the corner of his eyes but Sinedd chewed at the corners of his mouth, ripping into the flesh, trying to hold it together.  
Essentially every football player is an actor.  
They have to put on a brave face, a happy face, a humble face, a proud face every single day and every time they set foot on the pitch and when the cameras turned on.  
Sinedd was no different but he had learned from a young age to keep his emotions to himself. There was no point in telling anyone, anyway. Not like anyone would listen...

"Well," Artegor said, voice shaking with fury as he walked slowly around to the front of the desk, leaning back on the black glass. "If you're such an expert on strength, then tell me Sinedd. What makes a person strong?"

A tightly wound wire behind a concrete exterior, snapped. Sinedd took a breath.  
"Losing your parents to a war makes you strong," he began slowly. "Having to grow up in a strange house, with strange people following you around makes you strong. Having no mom or dad to cry to when you were sick or upset or lonely makes you strong. Having to deal with being "second-best" in everything makes you strong. Having to live your life on another planet with no one to guide you or talk to you when you're troubled, makes you strong.  
Having to deal with a flux that tars your lungs and burns through your body every time you use it but never being able to see a doctor about it because you "need it to win", makes you strong.  
_Sitting alone in Genesis Stadium with no flux, no family, no one to talk to, wondering why people exploit you and wondering why you have to constantly shove off other people just to make yourself feel like someone worthwhile when NO ONE else will listen...m-makes y-y-you str-...it makes you s-s-s..."_

Artegor felt a stab in his upper chest, watching the young boy's face dissolve. It was a dark, rugid face...a little sullen, gaunt and pale but subtly charming all the same. A pair of violet eyes were brimming under a soft jet-black fringe and bared teeth only barely concealed the strangled whimpers that were trying to force through.

For the first time, he saw Sinedd for who he really was. A stone statue...but a hollow one. One perfectly crafted on the outside but had nothing but an empty void on the inside.  
One that everyone was cutting into everyday...one that he had helped to break.

Wordlessly, he stepped forwards, removed his sunglasses and tucked them into his pocket, to reveal the glittering black eyes that the galaxy barely ever got to see.  
He let out a sigh. "You know Sinedd, I saw a face like that before..."

Sinedd looked up, eyes damp but brows raised. "What?"  
"That face," he went on, sitting down next to Sinedd. "I saw it somewhere before...on another football player I believe...quite talented...a pretty dark guy though...ambitious though, very ambitious..."

He leaned over to Sinedd, giving him a bemused smile that looked alien upon his normally sombre face. As he spoke, he delicately took a tissue from the box on his desk and handed it to Sinedd.

"I remember seeing that face, streaking down the pitch. He was a vicious player...always getting into fights with his colleagues, getting into trouble..._playing dirty_..." He paused, drawing a breath. "And running off when he got the chance..."

Sinedd didn't move when Artegor placed a hand on his shoulder.  
"Some people thought he was just a head-case...but maybe he was just scared. A boy, really...alone...just on the brink of manhood...submerged in fame and not really knowing where to go from where he was..."

Silently, Artegor moved his arm around Sinedd's shoulder.  
"Will you let me guide you? Teach you again? In return for your good behaviour, I'll try...to be a little more understanding..."  
Sinedd sat still for the moment, relishing the warmth of someone else beside him- who was talking TO him, not AT him.  
"Ok, old man..."

_"Coach,_ to you, my boy," he grinned.  
"We've been over this, _Coach, _I'm not _your _boy...," Sinedd grinned back.

"I think I remember where I saw that face..."  
"Oh? And where was that?"

"In my mirror...almost ten years ago..."

* * *

_Well, that's it! I hope you liked it Turkmen, you are great! _


End file.
